The Court of Cassation in Vladivostok Upheld the Sentence Against Liya Maltseva. She Was Given a 2-Year and 3-Month Suspended Sentence for Her Faith in Jehovah God

On June 27, 2023, the Ninth Court of Cassation of General Jurisdiction, having considered the appeal against the verdict of Liya Maltseva, a 53-year-old disabled woman from Partizansk, decided to uphold the sentence.

In September 2022, the Partizansk City Court of Primorye Territory gave the believer a 2-year and 3-month suspended sentence with restriction of liberty for 7 months and a probation period of 2 years and 3 months. A month and a half later, the Primorye Regional Court upheld the verdict.

In her appeal, Liya Maltseva stated: “The verdict constitutes an act of direct and indirect religious discrimination as a result of the campaign of religious persecution against Jehovah's Witnesses as a group in Russia. By its verdict, the court demonstrated an attitude that is different from its attitude toward representatives of ‘traditional’ religions, without having an objective and reasonable basis for this. So, I was found guilty only because I am one of Jehovah's Witnesses.”

Speaking before the judicial panel of the court of cassation, Maltseva said: “In every religion there is singing, praying and reading the Holy Scriptures. I exercised my constitutional right to freedom of religion.”

Earlier, the Plenum of the RF Supreme Court determined that meetings for worship of Jehovah's Witnesses, their joint performance of rites and ceremonies, in themselves, are not extremism.